New Video of Ricks Spring Cave System

[Wizard]

Outstanding video. Love the colors. Looks like the Serpentine tunnel on steroids.

[JCDdiver]

Great video Wendell! Cool looking cave. What is the flow like?

[sskasser]

From the point where you surface into the first dry cave to the point where you submerge again is just under 300'. It is challenging carrying tanks along this route AND preventing damage to the dry cave. It is also a careful effort since you have just done a 1300' cave dive. This is an environment where you don't want to get bent from strenuous activity.

We typically offload our tanks and walk around admiring the dry cave for a while, just to give our bodies a chance to recover from the dive. This is also a warm-up period, since the water is typically 41F-43F, depending on the time of year. After a half-hour or so - which goes surprisingly fast when you're looking at stuff - it seems OK to move tanks. I know some of the young guys carry both tanks simultaneously but I'm an old bull ...!

The next video will be exclusively about the first dry cave. I'm not going to take the chance of opening up my camera system and risk getting moisture in the camera, sand in the o-rings, etc. My camera uses an SD card which only holds 45 mins of video at a time.

Amazing stuff! And Wendell...you are most DEFINITELY NOT old!

[Cold Water Richard]

Great video Wendell! Cool looking cave. What is the flow like?

This time of the year the flow is really nice, you can easily swim against it everywhere but the slippery slide tunnel, there the cross section is still small enough that we resort to pull & glide. During the high flow months, if you can get in at all, it's like trying to crawl up a firehose shooting ice water.

[IowaCaveDiver]

what is the air temp in the dry section?

[Cold Water Richard]

42 to 45 degrees

[IowaCaveDiver]

i should have figured considering all the steam coming off your heads!